


Of Pucks, Pies, and Parse

by goodmorning



Series: Of Cups and Kitchens [3]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: (if that's what they're calling it these days), Angst, Guilt, Jack's overdose is in this, Other, Some unhealthy competition, Timestamp, healthy competition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-26
Updated: 2016-05-10
Packaged: 2018-06-04 17:24:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6667681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodmorning/pseuds/goodmorning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And, really, it’s a good thing Parse likes girls, likes to talk about them, likes their soft voices and soft hair and soft skin, because girls are quickly becoming the only thing besides hockey that any of the team want to discuss.</p><p>None of them ever want to talk about boys that way.</p><p>Parse already knows he can’t be the one to bring it up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Of Parse

**Author's Note:**

> Worst title yet!
> 
> There's a slur in this, and also some underage drinking. I don't normally warn for things like that but figured I may as well.

Parse is eleven when he figures out he’s different.

He’s been noticing girls for a little while, had a few girlfriends, kissed a couple of them. He can talk girls with his teammates all day every day, take their chirps about how he can’t keep a girlfriend and chirp them back about their complete lack of game. And, really, it’s a good thing Parse likes girls, likes to talk about them, likes their soft voices and soft hair and soft skin, because girls are quickly becoming the only thing besides hockey that any of the team want to discuss.

None of them ever want to talk about boys that way.

Parse already knows he can’t be the one to bring it up.

Parse is thirteen when this becomes blatantly clear to him.

His center turns over the puck - badly, but they’ll talk about that later - and so Parse has to lay the hardest hit he can on the winger who’s got it, and he’s never felt better to be old enough for checking. He makes the hit, gets the puck free, passes it off in the direction of his best d-man. He can’t see why, but the play is blown dead right as the guy he hit spits on the ice and calls him a faggot.

It’s almost bizarre to him that he hasn’t been called that before, or at least not since he figured out that he wasn’t really straight, but he hasn’t. He’s small and fast and he’s been referred to as a pretty boy more times than he’d like to count, but the vitriol aimed at him before now has largely been kid stuff, calling him a shrimp or weak or occasionally an asshole, but this is new. It feels bigger. Meaner. He wonders vaguely if it would feel that way, like a punch to the chest, if it wasn’t sort of true.

He has a split second to decide how he wants to react to it - fists, denial, shrug and skate away, chirp him about how many more girlfriends Parse has probably had, call him something back…

What actually comes out of his mouth is, “You’re just saying that ‘cause you liked it.”

And, shit, it actually works.

Years from now, he’ll think back to this moment, and it’ll explain a lot.

Parse is sixteen when he goes to the Rimouski Océanic in the first round of the QMJHL draft.

He makes friends easily, and before long he’s got the entire team in stitches as he does impressions of teachers and principals and the dumbest chirps he’s ever heard.

Most of the team, anyway. There’s one guy who looks young, about Parse’s own age though he definitely wasn’t drafted this year, but he’s sitting by himself, serious expression on his face, not making any effort to be included. Though he probably doesn’t need to, really; Parse saw him at practice, and he looked miles better than anyone around him. Still, he must be pretty lonely.

Parse really wants to crack him.

He waits before everyone leaves before he goes to talk to the kid, because he knows if this goes badly he’s probably going to be chirped for weeks. He’s got a few pretty basic options - hello, how are you, handshake, no handshake, I’m Parse, you are? - but again his poor impulse control kicks in and all that potential politeness goes flying out the window.

“Why are you still here?” he ends up asking.

“I could ask you the same question,” the (apparently French-Canadian) boy responds, looking as serious as he did before, and Parse is about ready to give up and die of shame that he couldn’t instantly get through to this guy until he notices his eyes.

It’s not because they’re the color of pond ice around the edges of the “skate here and you’ll die” area, though he can’t pretend that hurts any. It’s because they’re crinkled, very slightly, at the corners. Parse knows faces well, which is why he’s so good at storytelling, and he’s noticed that eyes only do that to go along with a genuine smile.

Which means this kid is incredibly deadpan and probably hilarious, and Parse wants to be best friends with him already, or possibly more, since he looks like that, but he’s a hockey player so probably straight. Best friends will do.

“I wanted to talk to you,” says Parse, completely honestly. “But I asked you first.”

“Extra practice,” deadpan boy answers, and Parse can see that he’s actually serious, not fucking with him or anything.

“Want a partner?” Parse offers, and serious guy stares at him for kind of a long time.

“Sure,” he finally says, and Parse feels like he’s won something or been paid the best compliment of his life, just from that one word, and he’s not quite sure why.

“Kent Parson,” he says, extending a hand.

“Jack Zimmermann,” says the French-Canadian, shaking it, then stepping back. He looks like he’s waiting for the other shoe to drop, and Parse would try to figure out why but he’s got more important shit to figure out.

“Zimmermann…” he says, contemplating nicknames, and that serious face goes a little bit dark until Parse says, “why don’t I show you how it’s done, Zimms?”

“We’ll see about that, Kenny,” says Zimms, and Parse doesn’t even have time to chirp him for the lame comeback before he’s being dragged back out to the ice.

Afterwards, he’s exhausted in a way he’s never been exhausted before. He’s always been the best, no matter where he was, never really had to push himself or compete for a spot on the top line. But Zimms… Zimms is so much better than he is that it’s almost depressing. Instead, though, it makes him want to improve, so he deserves to be on a line with Zimms, so he can challenge Zimms, so they can score tons of goals and celly together every time.

So maybe he begs his billet family to let him pull a Crosby with the dryer, and maybe he shows up to practice early to work his stickhandling on the ice, and maybe he stays after to do suicides until his knees feel like jelly.

It’s not for _Zimms_ , it’s for _hockey_.

The day he finally beats Zimms at something during their extra practice really doesn’t go like he imagined it would.

They’re doing speed and accuracy drills, blasting pucks at the empty nets as quickly as they can. Zimms finishes a fraction before Parse, just like he always does, but this time his last shot pings the crossbar and bounces off. Parse’s doesn’t. He turns to Zimms, ready to chirp him for the next couple minutes until Zimms wins again like normal, but stops when he sees his expression, watches him viciously kick another puck into place, wind up hard, and bring the stick down, catching the ice and snapping it in half. The puck still ends up in the net, but it’s obvious that doesn’t matter to him at this point, as he flings the handle into the boards and makes his way to the locker room. The carefully controlled way he glides towards the exit makes kind of an interesting contrast to his attitude, but Parse can see that every ounce (or kilogram or whatever, it is fucking Canada) of his body language is screaming that he wants to stomp out of here like a spoiled kid throwing a fucking tantrum over ice cream or a pony or some shit. Weirdly, it’s almost nice knowing there’s something Zimms can’t do, even if that thing is “stomp off the ice like an angry child.”

Parse follows him, cornering him in the locker room to ask if he’s OK (which is bullshit, because 1. he obviously isn’t and 2. Parse loses all the time and doesn’t act like a fucking child, and he’ll definitely have to be annoyed about it after he fixes this), but Zimms has a few inches and a few more pounds on him, shoving past with embarrassingly little difficulty.

“Lucky shot,” he says as he leaves.

Parse wants to punch him in his stupid fucking face.

When he gets back to his billet house he does what he should have done a long time ago and Googles Jack Zimmermann to see if he’s got a MySpace page or some shit like that, something that’ll give him some background on the family Zimms never talks about, and oh. That Zimmermann.

So it explains why he’s so serious, and he thinks he can see it explaining the sore losing too - he beat 2 NHL d-men? At 12? It probably also explains why Parse seems to be his only real friend. 

So he corners Zimms in the locker room again after the next practice. This time Zimms doesn’t try to leave.

“Look,” says Parse, and Zimms is giving him that look like he didn’t know Parse could be serious about anything but hockey (which, to be fair, he probably didn’t), “I’m about to say some embarrassing shit, alright? So you need to sit there and listen.”

“I promise,” says Zimms, and holy shit his eyes when he’s completely serious almost make Parse forget what he’s trying to do here.

“I’m a cocky shit, Zimms,” he says, and he can see that Zimms is about to chirp him. He’s torn between wanting to see him smirk and actually saying what he needs to say here, but it does actually need to be said before Zimms can get angry and leave again so he takes a breath and continues, “and you’re better than me, and it makes me angry, but I use that anger, and it makes me better. And I know, I know I’m not on your level right now, but maybe I will be soon, and I want you to use that anger too, so when you push yourself harder I can push myself harder.”

He expects Zimms to get pissed and leave and never talk to him again, but Zimms is quiet and still and obviously thinking about it, and after what feels like a million years his expression clears and he says, “Nobody else will be as good as us,” and fuck, he’s actually smiling? _Hello, horrifying and inadvisable crush, nice to meet you._

“Good,” says Parse, ignoring it. “But you can’t pull that shit from yesterday again. Don’t think of it as a failure, think of it as a place to improve, or some bullshit thing like that.”

“I promise,” Zimms says again, and then they fucking light it up.

Parse is sixteen when he finds out Zimms is into dudes.

The season is over, and they’ve won, and now the entire team is having a party at someone’s parents’ secluded lake house so they don’t all get arrested for noise violations or underage drinking or some shit.

Parse is getting pretty drunk, throwing his arms over a lot of shoulders, telling a lot of his teammates that he loves them, bro, when he gets the urge to find Zimms, ‘cause it’s been almost 15 minutes since he saw him last and it feels weird somehow, being in the same place but not being together.

Thirty seconds later, Parse is out on the dock. Zimms is there, alone, right where Parse knew he’d be.

“Hey, Zimms,” says Parse, and sits down next to him, much closer than he ever would sober. It feels nice, being so close to Zimms, like he fits by his side.

“Hey, Kenny,” says Zimms, looking like he’s maybe actually had a drink or two himself.

Parse smiles. Zimms smiles back. He looks a little sleepy and a lot adorable and not at all sad for once, and Parse has been really good at restraining himself but he’s kind of drunk right now and still not great at impulse control even when he’s pretty sober so he leans over a couple inches (or centimeters? centimetres? Oh, fuck Canada, he’s way too drunk for this) and kisses Zimms.

It’s kind of sloppy, because _drunk, obviously_ , but Zimms hums into it, sits up straighter and takes Parse’s face in one hand to deepen the kiss, and Parse is so fucking relieved Zimms is into this that he sighs, and Zimms leans back suddenly. Parse almost falls over trying to follow his mouth, catches himself on Zimms’ thighs.

“You’re drunk, Kenny,” Zimms says, robot face engaged.

“I know what I’m doing, Zimms,” says Parse, and it’s a huge fucking tragedy that he has to take a hand off Zimms’ thigh to put it on his face, but he does, and runs his thumb over that fucking cheekbone, which pretty much makes up for it.

Zimms turns away from it. “I don’t play gay chicken, Kenny.” 

“Gay chicken’s for straight people,” says Parse, and he feels Zimms flinch but barrels on because fuck it, still drunk, “so I don’t either.”

Zimms is looking at him again, and he thinks maybe he should really have said he doesn’t _start_ gay chicken, because he does play it if he gets challenged, obviously, he’s not a loser, but Zimms doesn’t say it, and everything is very still and heavy, the distant laughter and music from the party feeling unreal, unimportant.

“Can we make out now?” Parse asks, because he can’t take it anymore.

And they do.

Parse is sixteen when he starts dating his first boyfriend.

Parse is nearly eighteen when he realizes just how high he’s going to go in the first round of the NHL draft.

He and Zimms really are the best, just like Zimms said they’d be. They’re the biggest stories in hockey, bigger than Sid, than Stammer, than pretty much anyone in recent history. It’s a heady feeling, and he’s excited to see his future happening.

Las Vegas has the first draft pick this year. Parse has been looking for housing in Houston. 

It’s possible he could end up in Seattle, behind Tavares, but he doubts it.

He’s only looking for temporary housing in Houston, of course. If recent history holds, which it probably will, they’ll be trading him midseason to Montreal or Boston or some other actually decent team for as many 2010 draft picks as they can get their hands on. He’s pretty OK with that, with not having to shoulder a rebuild - or just a build, since these Aeros are an expansion team that never got off the ground in the first place.

Of course, the whole thing would be a lot easier if he didn’t keep having to convince Zimms of their draft order.

As time goes by, he reassures him less often. It’s one thing to know you’re second best, to be comfortable or even happy with it. Saying it all the time, though… it gets hard. 

And, anyway, Zimms doesn’t seem to need as much assurance now that he’s got those pills.

Parse is almost eighteen when he finds his first love unconscious on the bathroom floor.

At the hospital, Zimms stops breathing for exactly ninety seconds.

Parse will feel the numbers burn every time he puts on his jersey.

Parse is almost eighteen when he’s drafted first overall by the Las Vegas Aces.

Parse is eighteen when he visits Zimms in the hospital for the first and last time.

Zimms tells him to fuck off.

Parse can read the pain on Zimms’ face as well as he’s ever read anyone, and he realizes there’s not a single fucking thing he can do to help, and he feels wrong and sick and wants it to stop and why didn’t he say anything to Zimms’ parents and how did he not know there was something wrong and why can’t they go back so he can stop this from happening?

Parse is eighteen when he throws up in a hospital corridor, just outside the room of the boy who may never love him again.

Parse is twenty-four when he proves that hypothesis, alone in Zimms’ room with a shitty frat party going on downstairs and a little blond outside the door.

(Parse is eighteen when the Aeros trade Tavares to the Islanders, and just for a minute he forgets Zimms, fiercely glad to be an Ace, because fuck the Islanders so much, seriously, and that would have been him, if Zimms hadn’t...

Parse is eighteen when he tries to drink the shame away in a shitty bar in Toronto.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Rimouski isn't canon but I think I've seen it around fanon? If not, all I can say is it's a real QMJHL team which makes it plausibly the one Parse and Jack are on.  
> -Jack was granted "exceptional player" status so he started in the QMJHL when he was 15. (Tavares too, but we'll get to him.)  
> -Parse is good at noticing when people are uncomfortable but bad at actually doing anything about it.  
> \- Sid Crosby practiced his aim by shooting at the family's dryer. There's a clip of him and I think Max Talbot doing it for some documentary thing somewhere on YouTube.  
> -I thought, "they're at the party, how do they end up making out?" "GAY CHICKEN," screamed my brain, and I went, "that's stupid," but it ended up namedropped in there anyway.  
> -On a scale of sober to wasted, Parse is too drunk for the metric system but sober enough to make out with a hot guy.  
> -This is 100% where Zimms learned that the best way to confess your undying love to someone is with your lips and tongue but not your words.  
> -John Tavares went 1st overall in the real 2009 NHL draft to the NY Islanders, for whom he's currently a center and C. He was granted exceptional player status so he could play Major Junior at 15.  
> -The structure of a good rebuild is super interesting but also super hard to explain. I recommend marathoning Steve Dangle's LFR videos if you want to get a general idea.  
> -Parse used to wear 90 because it was his birth year. Then Zimms happened. (Also, Parse's birthday is July 4th which makes me really happy even though it's not relevant here (whoops, should have brought it up in chapter 2 of the last one I guess???). He probably owns about 60,000 pairs of American flag boxers and brags about it at the Olympics all the time.)


	2. Of Pucks

Zimms gets signed to the Providence Falconers and Parse can’t help but text some congratulations even though he’s sure he’s definitely ruined everything forever already by being a selfish asshole.

“Thank you,” Zimms texts back, and fuck, Parse almost dies, knowing Zimms is still willing to speak to him after that shit.

And then he gets a package, overnight delivery, in a box that says “perishable,” and Jesus Christ, it’s the most delicious pecan pie he’s ever eaten, and he can’t even text Zimms words so he just sends a bunch of emojis and eats an entire third of the pie right then.

It’s not really until later on that he thinks about where the pie came from.

The first time Zimms’ Falconers play in Vegas, Parse is at home, curtains drawn, lights off, minimal movement, because he was concussed last night, hitting a rough patch where the octopus had been thrown and slightly fucked up the ice right as he took a bad hit from Abdelkader, and just fuck the Red Wings _so much_ , how do you even get an octopus past security?

Actually Parse has thought about this, because it’s not like he has anything else to do, and he’s got at least 4 plans that would work, he thinks. And he’s familiar enough with the security guys that he can probably ask them, but right now he’s stuck and out of octopus ideas and really just wishes that he didn’t have a concussion so he could at least go on his phone or something.

Briefly, he tries to figure out who he thinks the Schooners will trade come February, headed for the bottom of the league as they are, but he’s no GM and anyway only remembers about two of them. Trying to figure out who the hell is on their top line is giving him a headache, too, so he should probably stop, even though he’s pretty sure this one isn’t from the concussion.

Nobody even tells him who won their game (unless maybe they texted him like the dumb assholes they are, Parse can’t be sure) until Panty comes by the next day with some lunch because he’s one of the many people who find Parse hilarious and one of the few who can stand him for any real length of time.

“Falcs, four to one,” he whispers, even though Parse has pretty much only been light sensitive so far (and that’s just great, seeing as he lives in the fucking desert). “Last one was an empty-netter, though.”

“Dude, I’m so bored and the team can’t even win for me?” Parse complains, barely managing to keep from flinging himself dramatically back onto the pillows. “Fuck everything, life is so shit when even soft things will hurt you.” He scowls at the pillows, but it’s dark and he’s pretty sure they can’t see his expression. So he punches one. His head throbs.

Panty listens to him complain until he falls asleep.

The first time the Aces play in Zimms’ Providence, it’s surprisingly fine. They both play a solid game, not amazing but solid; nobody does anything stupid or throws up on the ice or gets a fucking cephalopod concussion, and Parse’s regret and desire politely wait until after the game to jump on him, which is only appropriate, because they’re regret and desire for a Canadian which probably means they count as Canadian themselves and Canadians are usually pretty polite.

Though if he’s giving his emotions human traits maybe he isn’t fine? No, the doctors cleared him months ago, he can’t blame the concussion. 

They lose the game, 3-2 in overtime, but it’s not divisional so he doesn’t really give a shit that the Falcs get the two points, and the Aces still get their “you made it past regulation” point which is fine, and they even get invited to Zimms’ house which is... complicated.

The invitation is conveyed to them in their locker room, before the press are allowed in, by Georgia Martin, the Falconers’ assistant GM that Parse may or may not idolize just a little bit.

“He’ll come tell you how to get there when he’s done with press,” she says, and, with a wink, stage-whispers, “There’s probably going to be pie.”

(“Hey, Kenny,” says Zimms, and holy shit look at him in that suit.

“Hey, Zimms,” says Parse, and, given the way he acted at Samwell, it’s surprisingly not awkward.)

There really is pie, several types, enough for everyone on both teams, fucking delicious like the pie from last summer, and he almost chokes on a slice of pecan that’s actually even a little better than the summer one when he meets the guy that baked them.

He’s the blond from the hallway, but his hair color and his hockey ass and his air of confidence are what stand out to Parse this time.

Oh, and the way Zimms is completely gone on him. It would almost be funny, Zimms having a type, except for the way it’s incredibly depressing.

Parse should really leave before he says or does something regrettable, and he definitely will, right after he tries the apple pie…

Which is how Parse ends up alone with Bitty, telling a very involved story (complete with pantomime and impressions) about his cat and the plumber, singing along to Beyonce songs (“Partition” is his fucking jam), even offering to dry the dishes so he can keep showing Bitty pictures of Kit Purrson on his phone, and even though drying dishes sucks _so much_ , Bitty manages to distract him enough that it’s almost not terrible? (Though he’ll never admit it.)

When the dishes are done, Bitty looks at Parse, a thousand questions forming as Parse watches, and he’s a lot freaked out when he realizes he’ll probably answer them. Luckily, though, he doesn’t have to, because Zimms comes in then, brushing snow from his hair.

The look on his face is a familiar one, and Parse’s heart isn’t the only thing that gives a little leap, because he’s fucking stupid, apparently. That look isn’t for Parse anymore.

He ducks out before they can think to stop him, but he’s pretty sure they won’t notice quickly enough to try, anyway.

It’s summer again and he’s asleep in his place in New York when his phone rings and wakes him up. He doesn’t answer, because when he cracks one eye open, just a sliver, the first number showing on the face of his digital clock radio thing Panty made him buy after the sixth time he was late to a morning practice is definitely a 5, and that means it’s way too early to answer the phone. It was rude of them to call anyway, unless it’s something really important, and if it’s really important they’ll call him again, so yeah. Not answering.

They call again. Parse almost swears but if it’s that important it might be something bad and swearing could conceivably make him feel worse about it later. Instead he just grabs the phone, keeping his eyes closed, because if he opens them he’s pretty sure he won’t be able to go back to sleep. If this call is actually important he’ll probably have to get up anyway, but he’d like to pretend otherwise for as long as he can.

It’s probably Panty; he can’t think of anyone else who’d be calling him at five-something in the morning. Parse has never told Panty how much he appreciates the wake-ups, even if it means the alarm radio clock thing is pretty useless, but it’s the offseason and fuck waking up this early if he doesn’t have to, so when he answers the phone he whines, a lot. Panty really deserves to be fucking whined at for this.

Only it’s not Panty. The surprise snaps Parse’s eyes open, and he almost swears again, but that would probably be rude and also this is…

“Bitty?” he says, still trying to process things like why Bitty would call him and why it’s giving him butterflies and where Bitty got the number and could this be a dream, actually? Because he has a sneaking suspicion he might be absolutely fucked on a romantic level now - not, like, romantically fucked with rose petals on the bed and shit but fucked in the romance department like he’s got a crush on his ex _and_ his ex’s new boyfriend and what the fuck?

But Bitty brings him back to the conversation, chirping him hard for being confused, which is the most beautiful fucking thing he’s ever heard and, shit, fuck, suspicion confirmed, he’s so fucked, and he finds himself arranging to meet Bitty at some cafe in Providence in a few hours, because he can’t even begin to wrangle his feelings enough to do this right now.

So yeah, there goes sleep.

If Parse dresses himself extra carefully, who has to know?

Despite the extra time spent getting ready, Parse is there first, paying up front because he’s not really sure how the conversation is going to go but does know he’s going to order a shitload of pastries and doesn’t want to accidentally stick Bitty with a huge bill. He’s his usual charming self to the staff, grinning easily and casually flirting, and they repay him by telling him which table has the best view and letting him sit there to hold onto it while he waits for Bitty.

He gets out his phone for something to do while he waits, but the view really is good and he ends up just watching the river, not thinking about much of anything, especially nothing to do with why he’s here. He does, at one point, vaguely worry that a seagull might shit on his head, but besides that it’s calm, and he feels more relaxed than he has in a long time, like he can take his defenses down and just watch the water go by forever.

When Bitty shows up, Parse can’t keep the smile off his face. He hopes he can play it off as being for the cookies.

When they come by the table, Parse really does order one of pretty much everything - not only because he still wants pastry but also because he’s pretty sure he’ll need it - and asks Bitty what he wanted to talk about, even though he’s pretty sure from what he remembers of the conversation that it’s going to be Zimms. It hurts a little, knowing Zimms is Bitty’s and Bitty is Zimms’s, but Zimms is happy and playing hockey and not likely to nearly kill himself like he did when he was with Parse, and Bitty is obviously pretty happy too except maybe just this morning, and he really can’t help but prioritize that kind of actually healthy relationship over his own selfish desires or whatever.

So he’s surprised when Bitty asks about Parse instead, and responds rude and snappy to try and hide it.

He’s surprised again when Bitty doesn’t leave him with a black eye for it, and then hugely so when he asks instead why Parse doesn’t ever visit them. It’s a question that really freezes him, because there are a lot of reasons for it but Bitty probably wouldn’t like any of them. Because it’s tempting, seeing them. Because it’s painful, seeing them together. Because he just really, really can’t. But it’s the biggest and truest reason that slips out before he can catch it.

“I didn’t know I was welcome,” Parse says, and he can only watch and wait for emotions to play across Bitty’s carefully blank face until his pastries arrive.

He eats two, delicious if not quite as good as Bitty’s pies, and is working on a third when he tries to get the conversation back on track. He immediately regrets this when Bitty, focused on cramming more sugar into his tea even though Parse is pretty sure it stopped dissolving two packets ago, stops, stirs it, and says, evenly, “You were in a relationship.”

It’s not a question, he can tell. Bitty isn’t actually that easy to read, out here in public, not like he had been in his kitchen, but he’s not even pretending he’s unsure about this. He seems to be waiting for Parse to say something, though, so he confirms it anyway, and gets part of the way through asking where exactly this is going when - 

“I think he’s still in love with you,” Bitty interrupts, and keeps interrupting every time Parse tries to deny it like that’s bullshit and he knows it. Parse is pretty sure of himself here, though, because there’s no way Zimms could still love him after all the ways he’s fallen short, all the ways he’s twisted the knife, all the times he’s been typical selfish Parse, but then Bitty finishes, “You didn’t see his face, Parson,” and it feels so weird all of a sudden, Bitty calling him “Parson,” but that’s not a big concern right now because Parse can really only think that Zimms is probably still terrible at using his words, that Bitty probably knows Zimms’ faces as well as Parse ever did, that he knows exactly what that face looks like and briefly, desperately wishes he’d never seen it, equally desperately wishes that he still could.

“Oh,” says Parse, and says it again, a mixture of elation and despair bubbling up in him, elation because _Zimms_ and despair because _Bitty_ and _pills_ and _you’ve already almost killed him once, you stupid shit_ , and ok, yeah, despair wins, _fuck_ , and when he finally gets himself back under control he asks why Bitty didn’t just ask Zimms about it, partially as a placeholder but mostly because he genuinely wishes this conversation had never, ever happened.

It seems to knock Bitty off balance though. “What?” is all he asks, and finally, fucking _finally_ , Parse isn’t the one on the back foot, so he presses the advantage, raising his voice, ranting like an asshole, emotions leaking everywhere, and he angrily shoves a pastry in his mouth to shut himself up as he storms off.

When he eats the cookies he can barely cope with what a piece of shit he is, that he can only ever hurt the people he cares about.

Over the next few months he doesn’t hear from them, which is normal and a huge relief and he doesn’t check Bitty’s Twitter and read, between the lines, that everything’s fine. They don’t contact him at all, and it’s just like always, and it’s good. He can feel balanced again.

Until he touches down in Vegas and gets a call the moment he’s in the cab.

Bitty leaves him six messages. He doesn’t listen to any of them. 

He only picks up once, the first time his caller ID says “Zimms” instead of “Bitty,” but then he realizes his mistake and hangs up before Zimms can shout at him, before he can say anything he really shouldn’t.

The cold shoulder doesn’t keep Bitty from texting him, though. It becomes a routine, reading his congratulatory texts first thing after every win, before he showers or changes or even takes off his skates, and if he almost murders his first d-man pair just for asking about it then that just means nobody will be brave enough to chirp him for it.

The second time Zimms comes to Vegas, Parse is fine, or at least as fine as he’s ever been since Zimms became a Falconer.

Zimms obviously isn’t.

Parse thinks it might even be obvious to people who aren’t him.

Zimms is slow, losing faceoffs, making mistakes Parse can’t remember him ever making, and in the middle of the second period he pretty much lets Parse take the puck right off his stick and wrist it home for the game-winner.

Afterwards, he thinks about finding Zimms, actually talking to him, asking what’s wrong now like he should have then, but there are far too many good reasons he shouldn’t, like 1. he’s not sure he’d be doing it for the right reasons, 2. Zimms has a boyfriend for that, one who’s probably a lot better at being a boyfriend than Parse ever was, and 3. even as fucked up as he was out there on the ice, he was still almost better than Parse.

He feels like he’s letting Zimms down.

“If you want to be better than the other guy, you have to train when he’s asleep,” so he takes that page out of the “Uncle Jaromir” playbook and doesn’t leave the rink until 2 am, and he’s completely exhausted but his muscles are singing like they’ve missed this, taking him back for a second to sixteen and serious blue eyes and a solemn promise to be the best, and he’s let Zimms down in so many ways since then, but this is something he can do, something he wants to do, and maybe it’ll be a tiny fraction of enough to help make Zimms be fine again.

And maybe it’s also for hockey. But it’s mostly for Zimms.

Between the extra practice and the post-game passing-out session, he doesn’t check his texts til the next morning.

There’s one from Bitty.

It’s a good thing his phone’s on the table, because otherwise he’d have dropped it, which is pretty much proven 30 seconds later when he actually reads the text and nearly chokes on his coffee because it looks exactly the same as all the other ones. Except it isn’t, because this time the team the Aces destroyed is _Bitty’s boyfriend’s team_ , and what the fuck is Parse supposed to do with that?

In the end, he doesn’t do anything with it, because he can’t. He types a thousand different messages and deletes them all. 

It’s not like he’s ever replied before, anyway.

He has a pretty acceptable six weeks after that, even if he does need to work out more. They win the games they’re supposed to win, lose some of the ones that are acceptable to lose; normal hockey happens, in other words. For the first time in his career, he doesn’t really give a shit about the Aces, though, because he’s putting all his hopes for wins on someone else’s team. The Aces, yeah, they’re playing normal hockey, good hockey, because they’re normally pretty good. The Falcs, though, are playing special hockey, hockey that leads to streaks, streaks that could become very special indeed, and it’s Zimms who’s dragging them there with every hard-fought win.

Parse is one of probably five people who know exactly how badly Zimms needs this.

That he feels special for it is probably something he’ll have to address at some point.

The night the Falconers play the Pens for sole possession of the record, Winnipeg is in Vegas. Parse has never wanted to go into overtime less than he does right now, not even when he’s playing slightly injured, and he ends up with a four-point game on the way to proving it.

He pays even less attention during press than usual, saying nice things about Byfuglien and nicer things about Reveille when prompted, and then someone asks him how he feels about the new winstreak record and it’s all he can do to keep his media face on because what he really wants to do is laugh or cry or both, mostly while hugging Zimms because _YES_ , but he can’t do any of that, so he says some generic nice things about the Falconers until someone asks him what he’d say to Zimms about it if Zimms were here and his tongue runs away from him just a little bit. Instead of the canned response he had ready, he finds himself saying some stupid thing about there being enough games left in the season to top that.

Which is, at least, outrageous enough that they’re satisfied with him, but seriously? They have a home-and-home coming up with the fucking Kings, shit’s not going to happen.

When they’ve gone, he checks his phone, as usual, and Bitty’s sent him a text, as usual, but what he’s done just feels so insubstantial compared to Zimms, and this time he knows exactly what to say,

“Congratulate Jack,” Parse sends, and it’s the first time since they met that Parse has called him anything but Zimms, even in his own head.

Jack is what Bitty calls him.

The next day Parse starts pushing himself harder.

The second time the Aces come to Zimms, it’s Parse’s turn to be fucked up. He’s lost some weight even though he constantly consumes protein. He’s been training so hard the last couple days that he maybe hasn’t really slept more than six hours total. Probably he looks a little bit dead.

And those are the only reasons he looks like shit, ok? It has nothing to do with the weird feelings he’s getting from being in Providence again or Zimms apparently being totally fine somehow.

Afterwards, he doesn’t remember much of the game. Only the sound of the ice, and Zimms, and his face when he scored the game-winner. 

He’s pretty sure he was imagining the worried expression during the third face-off.

When Parse gets back to the hotel, he sleeps so much that he almost misses their flight.

So maybe the Aces play the Blackhawks April 7th, and maybe the Frozen Four is happening the 6th and the 8th, and maybe he stays through their rare free day so he can watch Bitty. Maybe he wears red, too. It is an Aces color, after all.

And when Bitty wins, 4-1, maybe Parse almost texts him.

Almost.

Two days later, he’s in Colorado, and they beat the Avs by the same scoreline.

And then it’s the playoffs. Parse stops trimming the beard he started the night they clinched (not out of superstition, but because he’s so blond his beard needs a head start if he wants it to actually be visible by the second round) and gets ready to play the Ducks.

Even though they didn’t end up first in their division (fucking Kings, fucking home-and-home, fucking Quick), playing Anaheim kind of makes up for it, in Parse’s opinion. It’s not because he particularly likes playing there or because he thinks they’re easier to beat than, like, the Sharks, it’s because they’re one of very few teams that he can play against and not be the most hated player on the ice.

And, yeah, ok, he knows he’s got a reputation for having a huge ego and a bad attitude, but come the fuck on, it’s not like he lays a lot of dirty hits or takes a lot of penalty minutes - he’s been a finalist for the Lady Byng four times, for fuck’s sake - and he doesn’t tend to be a pest either or even do much chirping beyond his smirk which he’s pretty sure his face just _does_ , really. It helps that he can tell himself they’re just jealous, but it’s kind of exhausting to be a hatred magnet and it’s been worse these last two seasons with everyone comparing him to Zimms all the time. Fuck, how is he supposed to out-polite a Canadian, anyway?

All the same, he doesn’t expect the Ducks to be easy to beat - they play well, they’re not some shitty wild card team - but they really kind of are.

The Aces win easily in the first two games at home, and Parse can tell it’s easy because even at the end of the third period the “I’m sweating so much it got all over my visor and now I can’t see” towels aren’t really as damp as he’s pretty sure they should be. Probably also it’s because they were up by three goals at the end of the first and just mostly played keep-away rather than actually trying to score. They’re probably not very exciting, especially for playoff games, but Parse gives less and less of a shit about the Aces’ “fans” every season he plays for them, and a win’s a win anyway, they can fucking deal with it. They lose the third game on the road, which, ok, fine, they deserve, but bounce back and win the fourth, and it’s finally a good game, with the Ducks playing like an actual hockey team and the Aces playing like they actually mean it and both those things happening at the same time and it’s nice, because Parse doesn’t want to look like shit in the second round just because he’s out of practice. And then Zimms sweeps the Rangers, and fuck, he’s super distracted by that at the game, the way Zimms looked in his postgame interviews and the way his team swept the Rangers even though the Rangers were playing really well and the way Parse and the Aces should have swept the Ducks but didn’t, but apparently his autopilot is fucking amazing because he gets two assists and an empty-netter anyway and they clinch, just like that.

He wonders vaguely if the Ducks will have yet another new head coach next season, but there are more important things to worry about, like the Sharks vs Kings series that the Kings somehow haven’t locked down yet.

When he watches Games 5 and 6, he can see why - Quick’s changed his style, doesn’t come out to the top of the crease as much, and he’s coughing up a lot more rebounds than he has all season. When the Sharks finally lose Game 7 in triple overtime, Parse makes a note to hang out near the net more than usual. He’ll take a lot more abuse there but it’ll definitely be worth it.

They lose the first game in LA, Kopitar on the breakaway with the only goal, but they win the second 1-2, both goals by Parse on rebounds, and it feels good knowing he really can play, that he’s got the hockey sense as well as the speed and the soft hands. He hasn’t been confirming that to himself much recently. They win both in Vegas with more of the same, and then it’s back to LA where the Kings get lucky in OT with a weirdly bouncing puck, but it’s too little too late for them, and Parse buries the series-clinching goal on home ice, 6 minutes left in Game 6.

And then it’s the Western Conference Finals against Houston, bracket-busting wildcard Houston, could-have-been-Parse’s-team Houston, but Parse isn’t even a little worried about them even if they did upset the Blues and the Stars to get here; their reliance on the chip-and-chase is something his d-men are well equipped to handle, especially if his third and fourth lines can keep up their possession numbers.

No, what Parse is more worried about, and maybe it’s cocky or bad karma or something to assume they’re going to win, but he doesn’t give a shit because they really are and there’s no point being modest in your own head, is the Eastern Conference Finals. No matter who wins, it’s going to be hard. Tampa Bay’s offense is really fucking hard to stop, and Bishop is a goddamned goaltending machine. On the other hand, there’s Providence, and fucked if he isn’t going to be really fucked up by that again, probably.

But he should probably focus on the Aeros, even if he’s pretty sure they won’t be a problem. And the Aces do win the first three fairly easily, the defense shutting down most of Houston’s chances without any problem at all, but they lose the fourth, probably because the Falcs are up on the Lightning 3-1 in the series and fuck, they’re probably going to be playing Zimms, and the whole team is pretty distracted trying to keep Parse from being distracted and it just really doesn’t work, basically. Whatever, they’re allowed to have bad games; they just don’t usually all have the same one is all. There’s still no chance of Houston coming back and winning the series, it’s fine.

He’s still not sure how he feels about playing Zimms - excitement, confusion, terror, inadequacy - when the Falcs clinch it the next night.

He’s even less sure the night after, when the Aces do the same, except he knows that he wants it more than anything. He picks the pocket of an Aeros d-man, charges up the ice, easily fakes out the goalie, and that pretty much puts the game away. He can’t look too excited, though, because 1. the Campbell Bowl is a fickle bitch and 2. oh, fuck, it’s him against Zimms for the Stanley Cup.

_Shit, this is going to fuck him up so bad._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -Obviously there are ~6 years missing here in which you can assume that Parse gains his hard-partying, hard-flirting reputation. It didn't fit well into the flow of this particular story, but you can assume he picks up a lot of tall people with dark hair, blue eyes, and great asses.   
> -It occurred to me while I was writing this that Sid Crosby was basically Mario Lemieux's hockey son, so that makes him and Jack hockey cousins which I 100% wish I'd thought of sooner. I wonder if Jack uses the same brand of peanut butter?  
> -I mentioned before the octopus-throwing habits of the Red Wings fans but hadn't really realized the extent to which an octopus can fuck up the ice.  
> -Real player rundown: Justin Abdelkader is a left winger for the Detroit Red Wings. He's actually quite good when he's not playing like a goon, but he plays like a goon a lot and it sucks. Dustin Byfuglien is the heaviest player in the NHL; he's played RW on occasion in the past but currently plays defense for the Winnipeg Jets. Jonathan Quick is the starting goalie for the LA Kings; he's a Vezina finalist this season and typically a much better player than depicted here. Anze Kopitar is a center and A for the Kings, for whom he's been the top scorer every single season since 2007-08.  
> -"Despair" is probably a little overdramatic, but so is Parse.  
> -Parse was getting a little lazy in the NHL without Zimms there He still trained, obviously, but he didn't push as far as he could have.  
> -The "train when he's asleep" quote is loosely paraphrased from a translation of a real Jagr quote.  
> -Hockey players lose a lot of weight in the postseason because they're playing that much harder. It's pretty interesting to look into how they work out during the preseason/regular season, building muscle mass and avoiding too much cardio.  
> -The players on the Ducks that people seem to dislike are Corey Perry (players dislike him for occasional pest behavior) and Ryan Kesler (everyone dislikes him for all kinds of reasons, but especially Canadians). I don't know much about the Ducks though.  
> -Normally I don't post a part until I've finished writing the next one. That didn't happen here. I finished this one this morning. It's therefore not as edited into submission as most of the first story is.


	3. Of Pies

The thing is, Parse fully expected this to happen, knew he’d reach the Final because he’s Parse and Zimms would reach the Final because he’s Zimms, knew Zimms would have home ice advantage even before the Presidents’ Trophy. It’s felt inevitable since the very beginning of the season, and he’s pretty sure at this point that it’s also inevitable that he’s going to lose.

Not that he’s not going to try to win, but Zimms… Zimms is still better than him. And the Falcs probably edge out the Aces in one or two other categories as well. But he will try. A third Cup would go maybe a little bit of the way towards making him forget all the other things he wants that badly. Zimms. Bitty.

When they get to Providence the night before Game 1, it’s raining. It doesn’t rain much in Vegas, and it makes him want to pull some romantic movie bullshit with a boombox or a truckload of flowers or some other stupid shit like that, but it’s late and he doesn’t know where to find any of that and also what the fuck is he thinking? This is real life, for fuck’s sake. Grand gestures are just for fiction. He could text them, though, ask to meet. They don’t seem to hold any grudges against him for the summer, the Falcs’ defeat in Vegas. Bitty probably has some relatively healthy desserts stashed away, and Zimms would probably be willing to talk through the games they’ve both played this postseason, and they’d probably welcome him even if they were planning to do some couple shit. So he could totally text them.

He doesn’t text them.

Bitty is in the crowd at the Dunkin’ Donuts Center, and Parse is willing to blame that and the inevitability for the Aces losing the first two games of the series. He’s not sure if it covers them getting shut out in Game 1, but he’s trying not to think about that because it just pisses him off. At least they only lost by one goal each time, though; it’s not like they’re getting completely destroyed out there like he thought they would be. It kind of makes him feel like they can actually do this thing.

When they head back to Vegas for Games 3 and 4, that feeling only grows, because they win both, 3 by the biggest margin so far this series, and Parse is definitely not texting Zimms after those ones even though he’s kinda drunk celebrating because he’s pretty sure Zimms would either kill him or kiss him and he’s completely unsure which one of those would actually be worse for him in the long run. Anyway, the pull of the Cup is stronger now than it was before, now that he knows it’s a possibility to win, that he’s not just waiting to lose.

Of course, hope only exists to be crushed, much like the Aces are crushed 4-0 on their return to Providence, and Parse is so pissed he throws his helmet at the plexi and Jesus, where did that ref come from? Shit, he’s going to get so fucking suspended for this and they’re going to lose the next game without him and it’s going to be all his fault for throwing a stupid fucking temper tantrum.

He manages to pull himself together enough to lie and say he tripped, and he knows how stupid it sounds, especially since he was probably on camera the whole time, but he doubles down and brazens it out and it works, somehow. They don’t even call a disciplinary hearing.

So they’re back home and it’s do-or-die, and that’s when he sees Bitty in the crowd and thinks, _fuck, we’re going to lose_ , because Bitty’s been at all the Providence games and they haven’t won a single one of them and also the whole situation there takes his mind really far away from hockey, but then he looks at the rest of the crowd and sees kids, maybe more than usual although he can’t be sure about that since he doesn’t look at the fans much anymore. The thing about kids is that, unlike most of the adults at the game, they actually mean it when they cheer. They’re not looking for satisfaction on a bet or some kind of bragging rights, they just want the sheer excitement of a win, and this is the first time in a long time that Parse has taken inspiration from anything but his hockey or his team or the people close to him. He tips a couple pucks over the short glass to a family in the front row.

It feels good.

It feels even better when they win, with a score of 2-1 and the home crowd on their feet and he finds himself not even caring if they’re just cheering because they’ve got the under or if they actually mean it. Still, he’s careful not to look at Bitty while he circles aimlessly with his stick in the air and a grin on his face.

And then they’re off to Providence again for Game 7, and the odds are against them but Parse is ok with that; the Aces seem to beat the odds more often than they should, and nobody’s sure whether it’s Vegas rubbing off on them, or Parse, or some kind of wizardry, but whatever it is, it’s there and it works. 

The Falcs are already on the ice when Parse comes out, just behind Reveille, and he sees Zimms looking at him like he used to and it’s a little weird, but it’s gone after the anthem is done, when Zimms leans in and asks, “Would you mind coming over tomorrow, to catch up? I think we have kind of a lot to talk about, don’t you?”

“I’ll try,” says Parse, and shakes his hand.

It’s a challenge, probably the best game he’s ever played, both teams with a lot of intensity, and after a couple scoring chances for each side produce nothing, he feels settled into the rhythm of the game. That, it turns out, was maybe too soon, because just like everyone else on the Aces, he gets hypnotized by Providence’s top-line wingers passing to each other through the neutral zone and towards Reveille and so nobody’s covering Zimms when they flip it back to him and he one-times it straight into the back of the net.

So that happens.

Parse isn’t on the ice when the Falcs’ third line scores too, and maybe he’ll have to talk to his goalie later about giving up that rebound but right now they’re down 2-0 and he’s not ready to roll over and die yet.

The next time he gets out onto the ice he ends up with a breakaway off a bad turnover in the neutral zone, and he hits the puck as close to the corner as he can, gloveside, and he thinks it’s gone wide until he sees the goal light on and holy fucking shit, he’s on the board and what a fucking amazing goal to do it with.

The second period sees another Aces goal, and Parse isn’t on the ice for this one but he makes sure to congratulate everyone involved as loudly and sincerely as he can because they’re tied, shit, they’re _actually tied_ , and there’s still a whole third period to score in and maybe they can actually do this.

The third period is shit, actually, just penalties raining down everywhere, and given that this is the playoffs and the refs call barely anything in the playoffs, Parse is kind of disgusted with pretty much everyone on the ice, and even more so when he gets away with a hook on one of Zimms’ wingers. When they finally end up back at even strength, though, nobody’s accomplished anything except possibly a lot of bad blood which will be absolute hell in the handshake line, and Parse is tired and slightly distracted but that’s no excuse for anyone, least of all the d-man who lets Zimms intercept a bad pass and take it to the net and then execute a beautiful Parson-Zimmermann no-look-one-timer only it’s Zimms instead of Parse and some winger who’s not Parse instead of Zimms and, if he’s being honest, that thought is way more depressing than the fact that Providence is ahead now.

For the remaining 2:33, Johnson is a brick wall.

The game ends. The Aces lose.

In the handshake line, Zimms says, “Please, Kenny,” and Parse really can’t deny him when he looks like that, when he’s won the Cup but looks like he’d give it to Parse in exchange for this if he could.

“I promise,” says Parse, and moves on to shake the next hand.

As the captain, it’s pretty much his job to go out and commiserate with the rest of the team. Normally, he uses these losses as an excuse to get obnoxiously drunk and think a little less about how much his life sucks, but this time he sticks to just a couple drinks, pretending to be the responsible one for once. Really he just has a lot to think about.

The next time he checks his watch, the one he wanted to tell Bitty wasn’t worth even close to as much as one of his pies, let alone his life, it’s after midnight, and his mildly tipsy brain tells him that ‘after midnight’ means it’s officially ‘tomorrow’ so he should probably head over to Zimms’ house and get this probable estrangement over with so he still has time to drink some more before their flight.

A lot more, even.

By the time he gets there he remembers what it was like to win the Cup and that Zimms is probably still doing media or is out celebrating with his team or something, but there’s a light on and it doesn’t sound like the party is here so he figures, _what the hell_ , and rings the doorbell. 

Bitty answers the door, smiling, with a smudge of flour on his nose. He doesn’t look at all surprised to see that it’s Parse standing there on Zimms’ doorstep - Zimms’ _and Bitty’s_ doorstep, obviously - just invites him in, still smiling, and tries to fuss over him while, Parse guesses, figuring out how drunk he is. Bitty seems to be satisfied, whatever his conclusion, and he gives Parse a cookie and tells him to go watch some TV until Jack gets in, please, you’ll just get in the way in the kitchen.

The cookie is delicious, and SportsCenter is mindless, and the sweet smell of baking wraps around Parse, and he falls asleep before he even notices he’s tired at all.

He wakes up suddenly when the living room door slams closed and the light flicks on, and the first thing he sees is Zimms looking at him over the back of the ridiculously comfortable couch, and this is probably still a dream because Zimms has never looked at him with that much tenderness.

“Missed you, Zimms,” says Parse, but it becomes apparent that this is actually not a dream at all because there’s someone else in the room, almost talking over him.

“Goodness, y’all started without me?” says the someone else, and oh, that’s Bitty, but that’s definitely not what Bitty would have said if this were a dream, and in the time it takes for Zimms to look back at Bitty, Parse is already on his feet, looking for an exit because this was such a fucking terrible idea and he definitely doesn’t want to hear Zimms tell him to fuck off again, especially not since this time would actually be forever, and he’s about to say as much, or, more likely, to run and pretend never speaking to them again was his own idea, when Zimms takes a breath and speaks himself.

Softly and warmly, Zimms says, “Stay, Kenny,” and he’s still freaking out but he can’t bring himself to leave now, so he sits.

In an armchair, of course, so they don’t try to sit next to him. This will be hard enough without that. 

The armchair squeaks, and he freezes for a minute, thinking, _fuck, what if I broke their chair, that’s just going to make shit worse_ , but it doesn’t seem to be broken and they don’t seem to be angry so he lets out a breath until he sees SportsCenter and there’s Zimms with the Cup, kissing the hell out of Bitty, and he knew he had no chance so why does it make him feel worse? 

And why does Bitty practically throw himself at the remote to turn it off?

And somehow they’re all sitting down now, and Bitty, in the middle, cuts them some pie, and Parse starts to feel a tiny bit better after eating it.

He feels a tiny bit worse after Zimms looks at him and throws sixteen-year-old Parse into the mix, tells him he needs to hear the whole thing, asks him again to stay, and Parse can’t help but respond as sixteen-year-old Zimms responded.

“I promise,” he says, and he’s never meant a single word more.

He regrets it almost instantly, of course, like most things to do with Bitty and Zimms, when Zimms says, “You hate drying dishes,” like he knows, and, fuck, he definitely _knows_ , and Parse is pretty sure he couldn’t win a fight with Zimms, maybe he should run? But they keep going, and Bitty reminds him that Zimms isn’t the only one who knows one of his inadvisable crushes, and then they tell him he loves them. Which he knows, obviously, but not that they knew.

It’s a good thing for Zimms that Parse can’t seem to move at this point, because Bitty doesn’t seem to have known how hopeless Parse was for him, so he’s still there when Zimms tries to get him to confirm it’s true, isn’t it, Kenny?

And yeah, it’s true. But he really didn’t need Zimms rubbing it in his face like this. 

He can see the future, another batch of lonely years while he tries to get over them, and maybe he will but he had so long to get over Zimms and never did so he’s not feeling hopeful about this one, and probably all of that comes through in his voice because he can’t seem to hide anything from them. 

“Look,” he says, “I know you two are together, ok? I don’t want to ruin that.”

“Who says you’d be ruining it?” is what Bitty comes back with, and um, what?

“Um. What?” is what Parse ends up saying, because he literally can’t think of anything else right now.

And then Zimms tells him they want him, and fuck, he wants them so bad, wants to take any tiny thing they’ll give him, but as soon as he thinks that he knows it’s a bad idea because pining for them is already ruining him and if he knows what he’s missing it’ll just be that much worse, but when he tells them as much they start listing all the things they want with him and they sound so _permanent_ , and then Zimms says, “Kenny, I want to get out on the ice with you _every day_ ,” and oh, shit, _Zimms is offering him forever_. And Bitty’s right there with him, nodding along, and, wait, the pie thing? All of which means _Bitty is offering him the same thing_?

“Oh, shit,” he says, and then covers his mouth because that was probably the wrong thing to say and he really doesn’t trust himself not to say anything more ridiculous, and he was right because when he uncovers his mouth the first thing he says is, “Fuck,” and he’s going to cover it again but then Zimms does it for him, with his lips, and wow, he’s really missed this. And then Zimms pulls away and Bitty is there, asking with his typical Southern politeness whether he can kiss him, and Parse nods, unwilling to trust himself with words, and Bitty’s balance on the arm of the chair makes Parse think of Bitty kissing Zimms that way and _fuck_ , what a thought.

Apparently he says that fuck aloud too, because he’s vaguely aware of Bitty asking Zimms what it means, and then they’re taking him to the bedroom and they’re all over him and it’s all sensation from that point on. 

They put him in the middle to sleep. 

When Bitty wakes up he and Kent are snuggled close together and Jack is watching them with a smile on his face, and he does wake up early but Bitty’s guessing it wasn’t that early and maybe they actually managed to get Jack to sleep in for once? They have a silent argument for a few minutes - Jack wants to go make them all breakfast, Bitty wants to wait for Kent to wake up first - but the problem is solved for them when Kent starts to stir.

Bitty kisses him, which is delightful, until Kent says, “Stop kissing me,” and really, Bitty should have known Parson was just going to hurt them, no matter how much he’d denied the one-night-stand idea last night, and Jack looks similarly disappointed which is especially sad to see after he looked so happy, but then he goes on, “My mouth tastes like ass,” and _oh_.

They chirp him a lot for that and then they’re all smiling and breakfast can wait.

Anyway, Bitty thinks he probably deserves a pie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -This is it! I don't know what I'm going to do with myself now. Maybe take requests? I'm tempted to podfic this but that's probably a bad idea.  
> -I really shot myself in the foot, writing most of the end of part 1 from Parse's perspective. To be fair, I thought I was done then.  
> -The Dunkin' Donuts Center is the arena in Providence.   
> -Parse is fond of other people's approval.  
> -Bitty was indeed trying to figure out how drunk he was. If he'd thought the answer was 'very' he would have put Parse in the guest room and made him sleep it off.  
> -Thank you all for being ridiculously nice??


End file.
